


The Tree Grows Crooked

by Area51Fugitive



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Akallabêth, Canon Compliant to the best of my abilities given the premise, Canonical Character Death, Fall of Númenor, Gen, Sauron Being an Asshole, Sauron has a kid, Uncanny Valley, because no, brief consideration of incest on Sauron's part, everyone else in Numenor still goes in the dunk tank, he just loses his body, he's still Sauron though, just no, l love you fandom, nothing happens though, sort of, wow that's actually a tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-23
Updated: 2016-10-23
Packaged: 2018-08-24 03:38:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8355559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Area51Fugitive/pseuds/Area51Fugitive
Summary: Sauron was once worshiped by the Dunedain.  They gave him their allegiance, their praise, and their daughters.  And one of those daughters gave a daughter in turn.





	

The Tree Grows Crooked

Sauron had come to them in chains, humiliated. Now it was they who knelt before him. The mighty King who had cast him down and made him prisoner now heeded his every word, and who would dare speak out against the “man” who was now the King's adviser? Let them heed his words and pay him praise, as their King had come to do. Let them reject the Valar and throw themselves into orgiastic worship for his lord, for dark Morgoth. Let them scream in vain for immortality. If they are foolish enough to believe that the chains of mortality, stronger even than the shackles that had bound him when he had arrived in Númenor, could ever be broken, then they deserve deceit.

They gather by the hundreds in his Temple, blasphemously built where the holy tree Nimloth once stood. They worship the Darkness, burning those who would oppose Sauron in the hopes that by offering the lives of others, they could keep theirs eternally. The great dome of the Temple, once silver, has grown black with ash and soot from countless sacrifices. Tar-Mairon, they call him as they drag unwilling, shrieking sacrifices to the altar. Lord Mairon. They love him.

To their so-called Giver of Freedom they offer up their friends and neighbors who still call the Elves friends. To him, their High Priest, they offer up themselves. They give him their allegiance, their worship, and, on occasion, their bodies. The noble men of Númenor give him their daughters in hope that he will grant them his favor, and the women themselves hold the hope that by consorting with the High Priest of the Lord of Darkness, they will be among the first to shed their hated mortality.

He must not appear ungracious and so he accepts, taking the women as wives. They cry out the loudest in the Temple, calling out to all who will hear them of the delights of worshiping the Darkness and the immortality that it will grant. They raise their voices in song to the Darkness, their singing almost drowning out the horrible screams of the men and women burning alive on the altar, the smoke from their bodies further staining the silver of the dome.  
One of his wives begins to swell, her belly protruding obscenely from the rest of her body. Sauron, loathe as he is to admit it, had forgotten that such things are possible. Lúthien, the abomination, had resulted from the pairing of a Maia and one of the Children of Ilúvatar. The thought that he has sired a child revolts and fascinates him. Still, he is kind to the mother and tells her that children are a type of immortality, carrying on the bloodline of a person. Why, this could mean that she will make the transition to immortal with far more ease than most. She is overjoyed and thanks her lord, singing his praises and annointing his forehead with precious oils. He has no reason to fear and react harshly. No child of his could ever be as Lúthien. And lashing out at the mother at what the mortal men would consider to be a joyous moment would do him no good. He cannot allow their trust to fade. Not now.  
-

The child that is born is so beautiful that she is almost hideous, invoking a sense of revulsion in all who see her. Sauron’s worshippers ignore this feeling and tell themselves that it is merely the shock of seeing a possibly immortal Man-child. The first, they hope, of many.  
Her skin has no fault, making her appear to be made of some other substance than flesh. Even the Eldar, ethereal as they seem to Men, can still be seen to be creatures of flesh and blood. Her eyes are so dark that they appear to be black, the irises nearly obscuring the sclera. There is nothing about her physically that can be said to be flawed, save for the lack of flaw. Those few who admit to themselves their discomfort around the child cannot find a way put into words why her faultlessness itself is that which makes her so abhorrent.

The disconcerting effect of the child only increases as she grows. Sauron finds himself staring at her for long periods of time in appalled interest. She should not exist. It is obvious just by looking at her that she should not be. His own fair form was carefully crafted to be attractive to the eyes of Men, to inspire trust and to exude a sense of wisdom. It is only unearthly enough to give a feeling of wonder. The child's form has no such sense of restraint. Her inhumanity is clear to all who behold her, though only those still faithful to the Valar are able to acknowledge it.

He increases the intensity of his campaign against the Faithful, seeking to silence them before they may infect the minds of his followers. He cannot allow them to notice how wrong his child is. If his followers ever realize the extent of her abomination, they will begin to suspect her sire.

He hides her away in the Temple with only her mother to see her. He cannot have her killed. The people will accept the deaths of those they see as Death-loving traitors, but the slaughter of his own child would be highly suspect. Even fallen as they were, the Dúnedain would not smile upon Kinslaying.

In an act of hubris that Sauron almost admires, the mother names the child Arphazel, a royal name. By the time Ar-Pharazôn begins to amass his Great Armament, the child is ten and her father allows her to again show herself to those outside of her immediate kin. Concealing her unnatural form beneath robes and veils, he allows her to sit at the side of his great black seat and watch as the throngs of Dúnedain writhe in worship to Morgoth. She says nothing, staring in silence at the spectacle below. The hidden nature of her mind discomforts Sauron, but he does not allow himself to dwell on such thoughts.  
-  
The years pass and the Great Armament grows. Ar-Pharazôn is aging and the looming specter of Death frightens him more than anything. He will sail for Valinor soon. The Men of Númenor believe themselves to be besieged by the Eagles of Manwë, and vow to strike at the Valar.

Lightning strikes the Temple and the great silver dome splits apart. There is thunder and flame and yet the Temple stands. Sauron stands unharmed, and the expression on his face is almost one of amusement. "Do you see," he tells the people, "How I have grown immune to Death? It harms me not. I have subdued it. This I can do for you as well. Follow me! Follow the holy Darkness! Shun the Valar and Elves who covet immortality for themselves and I shall see this gift given freely to all of you!"

Although Death has only ever come sooner to the Dúnedain since Sauron's rise, they believe his every word and bow before him, believing him to be as a god. His ill-conceived Arphazel still sits beside him, almost hidden beneath the armrest of the throne. Not an inch of her is visible. At nineteen, her loathsome beauty has grown so that she is unbearable for any but Sauron to behold. Even her mother cannot look at her unveiled without weeping, claiming that, "It is only because she is so fair." All but Sauron believe her. Still, he pays his silent horror of a child little mind.

Ar-Pharazôn is across the sea, heading to Valinor, and has his Armament with him. The war trumpets sound over the horizon, heralding Ar-Pharazôn's attack, and Sauron laughs with almost childish glee. It is beginning.

Thunder sounds in the distance and rain begins to pour down, falling on him through the hole where the great dome once was. A storm? Is this how the Valar plan to kill him? He laughs harder, drumming his fingers on Arphazel's head as if she were a great cat. "Look, child," he says, "See how they try to destroy me! Do they think that this will do any harm? They have already tried to strike me down with lightning and to what end? The Dúnedain only worshiped me more!" Arphazel says nothing.

The Dúnedain will soon all be dead, and Ar-Pharazôn with them; Sauron considers this, laughing once more. They will be struck down and only he will be left and Arda will at last be his, claimed in the name of Morgoth. Perhaps Arphazel, carrying something of himself inside of her, will survive as well, but he cannot see the use in that. He briefly contemplates using her to breed a more useful child and servant, but makes no real plans. She will not likely survive what is to come, and he does not regret that.

In his mirth at the thought that Númenor would be destroyed, Sauron does not see how this fate will come until, still laughing, he looks up. A great wave is rising steadily above the island, so tall that it is clearly visible through the open ceiling of the Temple. Sauron's laughter stops abruptly as he stares, his horror growing as the wave peaks and begins to crash down, seemingly aiming for the hole in the Temple where Sauron waits below.

He is not a Man and will not die the Death of Men, yet he quakes at the sight of the incoming wave that will destroy his body, his Temple, and the mass of wretched people that scream around him, begging him to stop the destruction. He tries to raise his voice in defiance of the Valar only to find that he is frozen from terror. All he can do is watch as the wave comes ever closer.

Sauron only barely notices that Arphazel is now standing, staring intently at the incoming wave. Her veil and all other head coverings have been removed so that nothing can block her sight of the coming doom. The inhumanity of this girl is obvious to all who see her through the panic. Her maggot-white skin is poreless and smooth as the obsidian of Mt. Doom. Her hair is as a slick waterfall of tar, with no distinguishable strands. Her perversely large eyes are black as the Void, with only the smallest slivers of white at the edges. She stares in awe, those monstrous eyes opened wide in her astonishment. Those people who had massed around Sauron’s throne in an attempt to beg protection now flee to nonexistent safety, completely lost. Neither of the inhuman creatures notices.  
There is no denying the end for Sauron. No great battle, no last show of power and strength. Only the crushing deluge and the terror that now grips his chest. This is not how it was meant to be. Not at all.

"To think," Arphazel’s voice breaks through the terror and the roar of the waters and her own lifelong silence, "that Men fear this blessing so." Then the wave takes them all.

**Author's Note:**

> As a self-imposed challenge, I tried to create a somewhat believable and canon-compliant daughter for Sauron, to see if it could be done. Her name was taken from a list of Adunaic names from realelvish dot net. Her description was inspired by Angela Carter's Lady of the House of Love, which has one of the best descriptions of the uncanny valley I've read yet. A bit of Helen Vaughn from Machen's The Great God Pan is in there as well. The end takes a bit from Hellraiser II if you squint.


End file.
